


Charmed, I'm sure.

by MrSnydeStoried



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cheating, Crossover, Cults, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Heroes to Villains, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Magic, Necromancy, Resurrection
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:13:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 6,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21959419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrSnydeStoried/pseuds/MrSnydeStoried
Summary: Doctor Strange is repairing the London Sanctum and dealing with the dimensional threats its fall has caused. He happens upon a rift in reality, through which he sees a universe where magic is more commonplace than in his and becomes *enchanted* (Ha) with a stubborn young Witch that he meets in the rift. He travels to her universe, only for academic reasons of course, and becomes entangled in a brewing conflict caused by the fall of Voldemort. Really just an excuse for a gratuitously fluffy romance story.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger/Stephen Strange
Comments: 15
Kudos: 54





	1. Ch: 1 Hermione

**Author's Note:**

> So this is the first chapter in a longer work, and I really hope you enjoy it. If you have anything to add, story suggestions or constructive or deconstructive criticism, I welcome your input. Till then, happy reading!

“Get Down!” Hermione Granger shouted as the coffee shop behind her exploded in a brilliant ball of bright blue flames. The residual light from the spell traced a line from the coffee shop window; through the space she had been occupying, past her fellow Aurors, and to the tip of the masked necromancer’s wand. He glared for a moment and her while she reapperated a few meters away, before turning sharply and sprinting around the corner.   
“We’re going to lose him.” Ron Weasly commented unhelpfully as he lifted her to her feet.  
“He just has to make it a few more blocks and then he can apparate again.”  
“I know, I Know” Hermione gasped still gathering her breath from the exertion she had just been put through. The mental, and physical, struggle he had been putting herself through to make this moment possible had nearly drained her over the last three months. Since he had appeared and begun; terrorizing the wizarding community; the Necromancer had somehow successfully avoided detection and detention by the ministry. She had spent the past year and a half hunting him down with the last 90 days being dedicated to organizing this specific trap. After obtaining a questionable lead on his whereabouts, she had a very specific charm commissioned, one that would prevent him from aparating within a one-kilometer radius. Simply hitting her enigmatic opponent with the charm had been difficult, and nearly cost two Aurors their lives. She had been afraid that once he felt cornered he would have fought harder against his assailants, but instead he had somehow seemed to sense the exact nature of her spell, and began running to the nearest edge of the dampening zone. He only stopped every few minutes to throw some dangerous curse or fireball back over his shoulder if any of his would-be-captors got too close for his comfort. So now, with only five blocks and two corners between him and his freedom, and with Hermione and her fellow Aurors closing on his tail, the stakes had never been higher for either of them.  
“C’mon! It’s now or never!” She barked, and then took her own advice and dashed around the corner after him. The Necromancer was fast, but she was faster. In addition to being in peak physical shape, she had more than a few potions on board to diminish the impact of her physical and mystical exertion. The Aurors, three on brooms and four on the ground chased after The Necromancer. It was clear after only a few moments that Hermione was pulling ahead. The potions increased her speed more than her peers, and the complicated patchwork of buildings that made up London’s downtown was preventing any form of accuracy from the flyers. Rather than wait for her friends she chose to widen the gap putting on a burst of speed that made her legs scream. She was only a few meters behind her quarry, she fired a spell, but the bouncing that her sprint had caused threw off her aim. The scarlet beam barely missed his head, sailing over his shoulder and demolishing a window on a nearby car. They were mere paces away from the barrier that was enabling the chase. Beyond the shimmering veil, muggles went about their daily lives, and magic flowed with no restrictions Freedom was a matter of moments away, yet it was clear that Hermione would catch The Necromancer before that would become an issue. Rather than making a vain attempt at escape, he whirled around bringing is want to bear at Hermione. There was a flash of blue light as the spell came streaking towards her, she tried to bring a shield to bear, but the hex tore through her still materializing spell like tissue paper. It was clear that she would not be able to block the spell, and didn’t have enough time to dodge. She drew in a breath and prepared for the spell to hit her, bracing for whatever maleffect it would induce.


	2. Ch2: Stephen

“So how bad is it, one to ten?” Stephen asked as he overlooked the ruined shell of the London Sanctum from a building across the street.  
"Eleven. Maybe Twelve" Wong replied from behind him.   
"The London Sanctum was a fundamental part of Earth's mystic defenses. Now that it's gone, foreign dimensions and alien universes are bleeding into ours. Demons and monsters roam unhindered through the city causing mayhem and wreaking havoc."  
"Are they killing anybody?" Doctor Strange sighed, already feeling a headache building in his prematurely white-haired temples.   
"At the moment, no." Wong replied. "They're just causing an inconvenience. Since last week every internet connection in the city became five percent slower. At three o'clock this morning every faucet in the city began dripping. The city's sorcerers and plumbers are fighting to restore order, but it's getting worse by the minute."  
"How can I help?" Stephen asked straightening his stance and stretching his trembling hands in anticipation of imminent action.   
"We need you out there fighting these things. None are dangerous yet, but some powerful threats are coming into our world. You have more raw power, and battle experience than any of us, that's why we let you be our Sorcerer Supreme."  
"Let me?" Stephen joked as he mentally called his cloak to his side. " I thought you HAD to when I saved your lives and the entire planet with my genius strategy."  
"Don't let your head get too big out there." His friend teased back, "I can handle the reconstruction while you're out. Oh, and Stephen, one more thing."  
"Yes?"  
"Be careful out there."  
"Has anyone ever told you you sound like a mother hen?" Stephen asked as he lifted off the rooftop. Then, noticing the genuine concern on his colleague's face, responded with a more serious; "Don't worry, I will be."


	3. Finding common ground

Stephen Strange, the Earth's sorcerer supreme, was tired. And bored. And irritable. Really, he was just grumpy but that feeling chiefly grew out of his feeling of bone-weary exhaustion. He had spent the better part of the day banishing imps and blobs from the streets of London. The thing he hated most about the task was its mundanity, its mind-boggling simplicity. The beings he was dealing with were so weak and their connection to the earth so tenuous that he rarely managed to even complete the banishing spell before they were dropped back into the dimension from which they came. Occasionally he would come across a rift in reality. That was the one time things became mildly interesting. they took the appearance of lines of white light, out of the senses of normal people. The lines converged on a central point, opening an angular portal to another dimension. Normally no larger than manhole, they let little more than exotically colored light through However, ones that had been left unattended would grow, and the magnitude of the threat that passed through increased as well. 

He could feel the Sanctum's restoration coming closer and closer to completion. It felt like the balmy rays of the sun gradually emerging from behind cloud cover on a warm day. The feeling of relief and empowerment flooded his cells with new power even as they tired from exertion. Wong was making good work, and London became gradually more and more inhospitable to wormholes, and dimensional intruders. This had the unintended side effect of creating a competition for the remaining vacancies in mystical coverage. As the smaller beasts and rips became less common the more hearty opponents grew into larger issues. Massive horned demons lurked in allies, tentacled monstrosities clung to the underside of bridges and rifts large enough to swallow a street became the norm. Stephen persisted, slashing away the limbs of the Lovecraftian horrors and baiting them back into the portals from whence they came.

He finally decided that he had done his share and dealt with the worst of the threats. Rather than simply open a portal to the New York Sanctum he chose to walk back to where Wong was working in London, hiding his tunic and cloak under the glamour of a collared shirt and slacks. It felt refreshing to walk amongst civilians without being stared at, or ostracized. To them, he was a normal businessman or doctor enjoying his life. He pictured what his life would have been like if it weren't for his accident. Back then he could walk down any street in the world and not feel out of place. He could have had a family, a career, success, wealth and fame more than any single human could ever need. He could have been walking down this street dressed in a business suit, rather than simply the illusion of it. He could walk into a store and buy a souvenir, or a gift for a friend, without worrying about portals or demons. He had been so ungrateful with his talents, and his ignorance. Back before he understood the way the world worked, he could have been, should have been happy. With what he had now, what he knew now, he was far fro successful, but no one could say he wasn't happy. He enjoyed helping people. It was why he became a doctor, and why he took on the role of protector when it was offered to him. The power to make shields come from thein air, the obligation to and ability to fight monsters, all satisfied a deep and primal part of his personality. As much as he had loved being Stephen the Surgeon; he adored being Stephen the Sorcerer.  
He was roused from his philosophical musings when he walked through a pocket of air that practically sizzled with arcane power. He stopped and walked backward retracing his steps through the area. The area felt powerful and almost sentient. It was an area on the verge of becoming a rift, where the dimensional barriers where thin, but not yet broken. He could force a breach to appear, and then force it closed to solidify the hold Earth had on the zone, but that process would be difficult, complicated and potentially unnecessary. He resolved to simply open a small pocket between worlds, and take a peek at whatever was causing the disturbance. If the disturbance came from a hostile creature or power, he could banish it and fortify the area. If the presence was benign or at the very least, neutral he would allow it to stay, for the time being. He looked around the street to see if he was being watched. Far from it, the street was completely void of any activity at all, highly unusual for this part of London at this time of day. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, as a feeling of unease settled into the pit of his stomach. Even by his standards, traffic in London being reasonable was eerily unnatural. Drawing in a deep breath and discarding his glamor, he conjured the spell that would open a space between realities. His hands glowed, and his eyes shone as he executed the complicated hand gestures that finalized the spell. There was a flash of light, and subtle popping noise as Dr. Strange slipped between realities and came face to face with a furious woman in a robe.


	4. First Contact

The first thing that Hermione noticed upon being hit by the spell was that it robbed her of her forward momentum. This was not, by any stretch of the imagination the most drastic change but it was the one most easily noticeable. She staggered, nearly losing her balance in her robe, as her brain and inner ears suddenly became aware of the fact they were not in motion. The second thing that she noticed was the walls. She appeared to be in a glowing tunnel that tapered behind her. It widened and extended for about ten feet before closing off behind a figure. The figure was the most shocking thing that she experienced after coming into this new realm. He was distorted, more than seemed realistic. It was like watching an impressionist artist paint on a time-lapse while wearing someone else's glasses. Not only that, but he was glowing. His eyes looked like candles and his hands like tiny suns. The rest of him was a blur of blue and red. She could vaguely tell that the figure was meant to have dark hair and pale skin, but other than that she could barely tell it was even human. She brandished her wand at the figure.  
"Who are you?" She called, her voice carrying an implicit challenge.  
"I am Doctor Stephen Strange, This planet's Sorcerer Supreme. What realm do you hail from, and what is your business in London?"  
Hermione felt as if her brain had stalled out while she was on a proverbial highway. It was as if every neuron was trying to argue with a different part of his response. A part of her was trying to interpret his bizarre name. Stephen Strange, some cruel parents had not only chosen to keep the last name "Strange" but add injury to that insult by giving him an alliterating first name. It also implied that someone was able to hand this figure a doctorate while keeping a straight face, something she doubted very much. The next section of her brain was attempting to formulate an appropriate response to his grandiose and seemingly self-imposed title of "sorcerer supreme." Not only did he title himself like some cheap stage magician from the turn of the century; but he had the gall to call himself the sorcerer supreme of not just a stage, or city but the whole planet. A piece of her wanted to blast this phantom, (for she was convinced this was a phantom the necromancer had conjured) into the next century just for his hubris. The final part of her brain was responding to the medieval insult he had thrown at her. Had he seriously asked from what "realm" she "hailed" and then proceeded to challenge her very right to be in her home city?  
The last part of her brain won out and she chose to reply with  
"I intend to save this city, and the world for that matter, from you, and your master."  
"My Master?" the shade asked, sounding genuinely affronted. A stretch around the bottom of his blurred face indicated he was about to speak. He stopped himself and asked  
"Are you threatening me with... a stick?"  
"It's a wand." Hermione declared following his eyes to the weapon in her hand.  
With a look of confusion that could be recognized even through the distortion, he slowly began to ask  
"A wa?"  
and he was cut off, the word hanging unfinished in the air. Around her, the tunnel began to shrink with a deafening noise of rushing wind, before collapsing into a single point of blinding light, completely obscuring her vision. When her vision and hearing began to return to normal, she became aware that someone was calling her name.  
Through the ringing in her ears she vaguely heard Ron calling her name, she was draped across his lap, and he was holding her head in his hands.  
"Did we catch him?" She managed to croak while blinking up at her boyfriend.  
"No he got away, but that's not important," Ron said earnestly. "He hit you with some spell, the one he's been using to blow things up, and then you disappeared. You just vanished. Then about ten minutes later you reappeared three feet in the air and fell and we thought you were dead, and oh Hermione." Ron rambled stroking her hair with his hand.  
"Well, I'm fine now." She said rising unsteadily to support her own weight. "I can't believe he got away. We spent so long setting up that trap and now he's gone. C'mon, we need to get back to the ministry and tell him what happened."  
"Yeah, the others are already there," Ron informed her as he carefully pulled a portkey wrapped in silk from his pocket and offered it to her. Taking it, they both vanished and the street began to return to its buzz of muggle activity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah, I tried to throw in some humor, just to spice things up. If you guys liked it, just let me know with a comment or a Kudo. Till then, Happy reading!


	5. The Aurors convene

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took me a while I had to get over a bit of writer's block. Well, here's the next chapter, it's a bit dialogue-heavy, I hope you like it. Happy Reading!

Harry potter pushed his glasses up onto his forehead and pinched his nose. The exhaustion and stress of his new job as head of the Auror’s office had a profound effect on him. Despite his youth, deep crevices adorned his face, radiating out from the lighting scar. His messy black hair was streaked with grey. If you just saw his photos as the milled across the front page of the daily prophet one would assume, not entirely incorrectly that he was being broken down by his job. The more observant, however, could see the way he stood straight and with pride, undefeated by evil or time. His admirers would expose how his hair’s grey was elegant and sophisticated, and that were far more laugh lines chiseled into his face than there were wrinkles. His closest friends and mentors seemed to be the only ones who noticed how he looked more like his father every day, while his mother’s bright eyes shone from beneath his immaculately kept spectacles. At this moment, however, Hermione saw none of that. All she saw was her boss, sorely disappointed by the news she had brought him, winding up for a lecture. It did not escape her notice how Ron took a half step behind her as the most powerful man in England drew in a deep, stabilizing breath.   
“And then he just vanished,” Harry said dryly, quoting back from the lackluster report Ron had just finished delivering. “The necromancer, who we’ve been hunting for nearly two years. The most wanted criminal in the wizarding world; just… vanished? Form a trap YOU two told me would be, how did you put it? Thoroughly inescapable? A trap we lost the lives of three Aurors to set up? He just vanished did he?”   
He looked up at his two oldest friends, a picture of bottled fury and bitterness. Ron looked down at the floor and grunted a monosyllabic affirmation, while his hand unconsciously drifted closer to his wand. It was his decision to look at the floor that caused Ron’s fear. Had he been staring, assuredly towards Harry, as Hermione was; he, like her, would have seen the wry smile Harry was trying so desperately to hide. Deciding that Ron had suffered enough Harry clued him into his true feelings with a small chuckle.   
“I’m messing with you, Ron. I am a little disappointed we failed, especially with so much on the line, but I’m just really grateful you two are alive. Especially you Hermione.” He said, turning a concerned glance her way. “Ron said you were disintegrated by that spell before you popped back out of nowhere. What happened, from your perspective?” He shot an annoyed glance at Ron, who had talked over Hermione’s earlier attempts at an explanation.   
“It’s hard to describe.” Hermione began pensively. “I felt the spell hit me. It felt like someone was trying to rip my soul from my body, like when you’re around a dementor.” Harry shuddered at the comparison. “Then something else happened like someone was interceding and intervening for me. I was in a tunnel of light, but everything was blurry. There was some sort of ghost there, it was blurry and colorful, and it called itself the ‘sorcerer supreme.’ Then the next thing I know, I’m back on the street like nothing changed.”   
Harry let out a puff of breath and turned away silently. He seemed suddenly older and more tired than Hermione had ever seen him. She pitied him, he seemed so small as he slunk back to his desk.   
“That’s what we were afraid of. The minister already received a similar report, minus some of the details only you had access to. She’s worried that you’re in some way compromised, to put it frankly. You’re the only person to get hit by necro and live, and you can understand that she’s interested in that. She’s asked you to go to the department of mysteries for a quick debriefing.”   
“And you disagree with her assessment,” Hermione observed.   
“Listen, I trust Luna, she’s my friend, and my boss, and the bloody minister of magic.” He fumed. “I get that she’s stressed about this monster roaming unchecked around the countryside while she’s barely holding the wizarding community together. All the same, I don’t need her taking my best Auror; no offense, Ron, out of commission just because she’s being paranoid. This sorcerer supreme you mentioned is a little concerning, though even I have to admit it. It could explain why Necro has been dodging our Aurors so successfully we theorized that he had some sort of relic, that dagger he always seems to have was our guess. If he’s working for some sort of powerful ghost it could explain where this influx of magic is coming from.”   
“Whatever it was,” Hermione added darkly. “It was arrogant, combative and condescending. I’ll go down to the D of M, but I have to warn you, that ghost was dangerous. I’ve never experienced magic like that before.”


	6. The Crossover

There are vague subtleties to teleportation that are difficult to appreciate until you actually pull it off. Dr. Strange preferred his sling ring to other forms of transportation. Many of his fellow sorcerers considered it to be too direct, simple, or inelegant. The most popular form of transport was the magic doors used in the sanctums. Every sanctum had at least one and even the sorcerers who managed to adapt to domesticity usually kept one or two around the house. It had been quite popular to integrate them into closets or wardrobes until Clive Lewis began publishing his fiction. After that, it was essentially a guarantee of mocking and humiliation from other magic users. There were still some magic closets kicking around the planet, most of them lying dormant without their creator to operate them. Still, Strange had never been fond of these, as he found them too efficient and jarring. When you stepped from one side of the planet to the other at physics-defying speeds, the human body tended to have an objection to the experience. Going from midnight to noon, for example, was a guaranteed headache. If you left the comforting scent of dust and freshly cleaned laundry that pervaded the New York sanctum directly into the pungent markets of Cairo; you might find yourself vulnerable to attack as you spent a few moments helplessly sneezing at the reaction. No matter what two places the door connected it was almost certain that they would be at substantially different elevations. As such, every single transition would inevitably lead to your ears popping and eyes watering. None of these experiences were inherently painful, but Strange found them indescribably aggravating. With a sling ring, however, air was allowed to flow both ways through the portal, and obtain some form of diffusion. Then you could simply walk between the two locations with no more discomfort than stepping outside from your apartment or opening a window. Going from Earth to another dimension was a different story altogether. The process was always guaranteed to be painful, and most didn’t have any air, to begin with. There was one especially nightmarish dimension that had sulfuric acid instead of air, and reminded him of venus, with a few additional monolithic structures and gargantuan monsters. As such, when he had to visit these realms he almost exclusively went in the astral plane, where his physical body would be left unperturbed. If he did that while sleeping, it became an efficient way of multitasking, and keeping his mind active.  
Teleporting to a parallel reality, however, was an unknown experience to any sorcerer. It had been considered theoretically for generations, with many mages even coming up with their own systems for how it might be possible. Yet all of these efforts had borne no fruit. To adapt a teleportation spell for another level of existence you needed to have knowledge of that reality. It was of course, possible that some of the mages of the past had succeeded, as many had disappeared without a trace; but with no clear plan on where they were going, they had no way to know where they had been, and could not return home no matter how powerful they might be. Stephen Strange had something that none of those previous experiments had. He had made contact with a being from another Earth. A short woman with curly hair, a British accent, and otherworldly magic had appeared to him a month ago in a rift between realities. Since then he had been nearly hell-bent on finding her again. Wong teased him that he was only doing it because he had a crush. Stephen protested, arguing that he was acting based on a legitimate desire to make contact with the first parallel reality mankind had ever encountered. Despite his obvious skepticism as to Stephen’s motives, Wong had aided him in constructing the world’s most complex teleportation spell. An entire room in the sanctum had been set aside for the purpose. Using a broom for a brush they began the laborious process of painting the swirling symbols into the floor. They used a golden stain, which Stephen found quite palatable on the dark hardwood floor, and he commented several times that this might become a permanent addition to the Sanctum. When the last swirl of gold completed the design, the two began the truly difficult work of enchanting the symbols. They sat across from each other, cross-legged on the floor, deep in meditation. They continued day in and day out, unable to quit lest the spell shatter before it was even completed. When they needed a break other sorcerers from around the world came in to supplement them. After just over a week of near-constant work, the design flared with yellow light, confirming that the magic was complete and potent. A ragged cheer came from the small group of magicians who gathered to witness it, to celebrate they went out to a local shawarma shop and ate to their hearts’ content. During the meal, they hammered out the logistics of Stephen’s voyage. They decided that they would refer to their Earth as Earth prime and to the other Earth as Earth two. Stephen would take only himself, his sling ring, cloak, and a small pack of essentials. The pack would contain a few changes of clothes, some food, a bottle of water, some rudimentary scientific instruments, and most significantly, the deed to the physical building of the London Sanctum. If the London Sanctum existed in the other world, Stephen would have a respectably sized home. If it didn’t, he would at least have some form of record he could show to authorities. The Eye of Agamotto would remain under Wong’s protection. Besides, as one of the younger sorcerers pointed out, “There’s no guarantee it would even work on another Earth.”  
After nearly a month and a half of prep work, the day of the teleportation felt almost like an anticlimax. At the appointed time Dr. Strange walked to the center of the chamber, his satchel slung over his shoulder. His attire was far more form-fitting and practical than usual if you could get past the flowing red cape gripping onto his long-sleeved shirt. Wong almost cracked a smile at the getup and several of the others in attendance struggled to stifle giggles. Strange only rolled his eyes at them and sat crossed legged in the central part of the glyph.   
“Remember yourselves, people,” Wong admonished.”As for you Stephen just remember the spell, focus on the girl, remember what she was like, remember her energy and follow it, the spell will guide you. If you don’t manage teleportation right away that’s fine, those kinds of results would need an incredibly powerful connection.”  
With the disclaimers out of the way, they were ready to begin in earnest. Soon the runes on the floor began to spark, tiny flashes of light like fireworks tracing the intricate lines of the symbol. The sparks sped up, growing as they picked up speed. Stephen began to float, completely out of his control, although whether it was the cloak or the spell levitating him was unclear. He caught a glimpse of surprise on Wong’s face, before the wall of sparks rose over his head. Wong tried to say something, but he couldn’t make it out over the sudden roar as the spell caught itself and began to swirl like a 2-meter thick sling ring. The noise and the motion and the light reached a crescendo, and with a pop, Doctor Stephen Strange vanished from his universe and appeared in another one.


	7. Landfall

Dr. Strange had traveled to every corner of the known world and to quite a few ones that were wholly unknown. As such, he had acquired a passing familiarity with the various scents life had to offer. Some of them were pleasant, most impacted him little, but there were a rare few that he loathed entirely. In that few there was an even smaller subset that would cause him to retch on contact, and chief amongst them was the acrid scent of burning human flesh. So when the first ever interuniversal portal opened in London, and the smell of cooking human hit him like a punch to the face; he immediately and helplessly collapsed to his knees, spraying the meatball sub he had for dinner in all directions. Only after about a minute of this retching, did he realize with horror, that his knee was resting firmly atop a corpse. He recoiled, scrambling backwards, and finally took stock of his situation. He was standing about halfway down a sloping pile of rubble and debris made mostly of dark stone. It was, upon closer inspection, s collapsed section of ceiling in an underground chamber, opening onto a scenic view of a Whitehall street, from far below. What it had collapsed into seemed to be a massive foyer. It felt like he was in a cavern, made of beautifully cut and polished dark stone. In the center was the ruined remains of what had clearly been a beautiful fountain once. Even in its destroyed state, it would have been quite beautiful if not for all the bodies.  
There were blessedly, only a few bodies at the side of the room where Stephen was. There was only one in fact, on the small hill of rubble Stephen had appeared upon. It had simply been a matter of bad luck that he had happened to alight on the very same spot as the corpse. It was, strangely enough, a lanky man; with scarlet hair, a beautifully waxed beard and mustache, dressed in a iridescent violet robe. A few prominent grey streaks gave his thinning hair the appearance of a peppermint stick. The shattered remnants of a pair of horn-rimmed reading glasses hung loosely off his left ear, and he held a length of pale wood tightly in his stiff left hand. He was sprawled out unnaturally over the debris, with a look of horror still written on his shrewd features. At the base of the pile, a blonde-haired woman in a beige robe was lying face down across the shins of a man in navy blue who had two large wooden sticks of differing colors protruding from his eyes. Even as Stephen watched, the flesh on his face began to flake away, leaving nothing but a pale, grinning, skeleton behind. A few yards on there was a dark-skinned man, whose robe had been soaked crimson from a thousand cuts. Slightly to his left and behind him were three teenagers, whose limbs and heads appeared to have been wrenched backwards. After that there was a cadaver blazing with an unnatural sky-blue fire, and on and on the devastation sprawled. The only light in the supernaturally darkened chamber came from the dozens of corpses burning in the magical flames, but it was enough to determine a pattern. While the corpses were sparse near Stephen, they increased in number and in the brutality of their deaths as they proceeded farther into the room. The massacre seemed to reach its zenith at an elevator shaft, which was glowing hellishly from within. A single scream echoed out of the shaft and raised the few hairs on Dr. Strange’s body that were not already on edge.   
He slowly picked his way through the desolation, trying and failing to avoid squishing the bodies beneath his feet. When he was nearly halfway through the chamber, he heard a horrible cracking noise underfoot, as he stepped on a pair of glasses in the dark. The noise seemed to be amplified in the relative silence, but it was the noise that followed that chilled Dr. Strange’s blood to ice. The sound of rippling cloth, as a fraction of what he had taken to be corpses wordlessly rose to their feet and began striding resolutely towards him.   
Immediately, Dr. Strange mentally went into combat mode, slamming his hands together, and then stretching out a whip of golden light between his fingers. Scarcely had he done so then the first of the undead was upon him. He could make out no features in the darkness, only a shadowy silhouette, backlit by the flickering azure flames. But an outline was all he needed. He cracked his hand forwards, and the ribbon of yellow light sliced cleanly through the dark mass. As the radiance of the whip shone out, he saw it illuminate another creature slightly behind him out of the corner of his eye. During the follow through of his first attack, he brought his hand back, whirling the whip above his head. As he brought his had down again, he floated up, and whirled around midair, brining the whip around 180 degrees to cut through the zombie as well as two he had not noticed in the blackness. He kept swinging, dispatching them with ease, yet still more silent figures flowed from the gloom. When one slipped within the reach of his whip, he was forced to contract it into a luminescent saber, with which he destroyed the abomination. His range had been severely reduced however, and even as he delt with the nearest ones, still more emerged to replace them. Eventually, one slipped past his defenses altogether, and laid its hands on him. His skin crawled at the clammy touch, and almost immediately afterwards, a searing pain enveloped his body. The fingers that gripped him weren’t just cold, they were freezing, frost immediately grew across his skin, burning him with its cold. He jerked back, reflexively trying to get away from the pain. He cut the offending monster in half, but the cold feeling continued to spread across his body. As it spread, he increasingly came under the effect of a sort of soporific magic. After the initial pain, his body felt pleasantly numb, and for the first time since becoming a sorcerer, the constant agony in his hands vanished. It felt so good, to be out of his suffering, and he was becoming so drowsy. He continued to fight, both his temptation to succumb to the effect, and the gradually thinning horde of monsters. Despite his best intentions, the magic in the creature’s touch gradually affected him more and more. His actions became sluggish and his eyelids drooped under the weight of the enchantment and the natural fatigue of battle. 

Realizing he was failing, Dr. Strange shot up into the air, trying to fly away. However, even this exertion was too great for him. His concentration quickly broke, dropping him to the ground. He could feel more than hear the approaching throng. Slowly, desperately, he tried to escape, in increasingly short bursts of flight, at last he found himself at the base of the rubble he had appeared on. Weakly, he tried to climb the rubble on hands and knees. He was dimly aware that he was bleeding, but his body was so cold that the blood had crystalized by the time it dripped out of his body. He found it odd, that he didn’t remember receiving a cut. Perhaps they had cut him after numbing him so he wouldn’t notice. It was really rather clever, he thought darkly, as he collapsed, resigned to his fate.   
Not a horrible death, he reflected. He died fighting, or rather fleeing from an unwinnable fight. A subtle shift in the rocks beneath him told him the swarm was advancing. Better to die at least facing his doom. With the final exertion his muscles were capable of, he rolled onto his back, watching as the silent, shuffling figures advanced on him. Just as he was sure hw was taking his last look at life, his vision was suddenly obscured by a wave of white fire, rolling from behind him, consuming the zombies completely and instantly. Stephen blinked back the spots the fire burned into his eyes, combatting the tunnel vision that was setting in at the same time. Just as he drifted into unconsciousness, he looked around, trying and failing to find whatever ally had sent out the burst of flame.


	8. He kindly stopped for me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nice and short, trying to get some of the plot out of the way so I can get to the good stuff.

“Stephen.”  
The voice was deep, and melodious in his ears.  
“Stephen, you must wake now.”   
Strange opened his eyes, groggily. He remembered a desperate fight, cold, clutching hands tearing at his soul, and then, a stranger.  
Stephen jumped back, now fully wake, his hands raised in a defensive position.   
“Who are you? What’s going on? Where am I?”   
The pile of rubble was gone, instead Dr. Strange found himself in a long hallway made of the same dark stone. In front of him was a figure in a brilliantly tailored grey suit. Black dress shoes were polished to a mirror finish, with grey silk trousers protruding from beneath a thick woolen coat. The white collar was immaculately starched, with a lemon-yellow bow tie. The figure’s features were obscured by an unnatural shade cast by a black bowler hat. The shoulders shook with mirth and a low chuckle emanated from an unseen mouth.  
“Oh you physicians, with all your questions. You amuse me Stephen, you always have. You are in London, buried deep beneath the Earth. On the other side of that door at the end of the passageway, a meddling mage is about to end the world. As for my identity, you know me well Stephen, just as I know you. I am your oldest friend and your greatest enemy. You have vexed me many times, Stephen, taking away what was rightfully mine. In fact, I once held you in my own arms, hundreds of times, and yet you fled again and again, to confront your erstwhile foe, and in so doing, ensured my survival. You know me, Stephen, surely you have a clue as to my identity.”  
“Death.” He hadn’t meant to say it, not consciously, at any rate. Once the word was in the air, it hung there, as if the notion had a palpable presence. It seemed impossible that the manifestation of finality could be before him, and yet he could not shake the certainty that he was correct.   
“As sharp as ever, my champion seelie. There is a being in this world who some call a necromancer. That one who wishes to pry apart the veil between life and death as did your Kaecilius. You and they are the only two beings alive in this desolate place, all others have fallen before the undead and their mistress. If they succeed in their endeavors, millions will share this unhappy fate, and then be damned to live on as infernal puppets. You must oppose them; and defeat them if either life or death is to continue in this plane. Sadly it is to late in the story of this world for you to do so, as in mere minutes, the goal will be accomplished and this Earth will end. However, if you had arrived sooner in this sorry telling, you may have had some true agency. It is to that end I give you this hallowed boon.”   
With this, he proffered a strange looking amulet. It appeared to be an hourglass filled with white sand between several concentric gold and brass rings.   
“Although perhaps,” Death mused. “You would prefer a more familiar magic.” As he said it, the amulet morphed and melted, taking on a new, instantly recognizable shape. The hourglass, with all of its sand, condensed into a single white crystal, and the circles formed the shape of an eye, quite similar to the one he was accustomed to wielding.   
“I give you: The Eye of Azrael. You will activate it quite like the one you are used to, but it wields a more inelegant version of time. You will have only mastery of that element in increments of one hour. Now, the hour of desolation draws close to hand, I will send you backwards in time, by my own power, so that you may halt these things which are to come to pass. Fare well spring knight, and good luck.”   
It was too much to process, too quickly. Stephen opened his mouth to say something or to ask some question, but only a startled shout came out as the ground vanished underneath him and he tumbled into a fathomless blackness.


End file.
